The ads for this engrossing movie claimed that it was “the true story
behind the greatest moment in sports history.” There are a lot of great
moments in sports history, and it’s a mistake to declare any of the
outstanding events “the greatest.” But what is shown in “Miracle” was
deeply impressive, and there’s no doubt that it is, at least, ONE of
the greatest sports moments: it’s the 1980 Winter Olympics victory by
the USA hockey team over the team from the Soviet Union. The last time
the US had won was in 1960; in all the Winter Olympics between, the
Soviet team had been victorious.

The opening titles of the movie put the story in historical
perspective, tracing the presidents (the film is very fair to Jimmy
Carter), national and international events, and mentions the Soviet
invasion of Afghanistan. Though a world war was not in the offing,
tensions between the US and the USSR were strong and disturbing. The
victory of the US hockey team was emblematic, a metaphor come to life,
the miracle of the title. (In fact, the 1981 TV movie, with Karl
Malden, about the same events was called “Miracle on Ice.”)

The weakness in the movie is unavoidable: we know how it ends. (But how
many remember that the US team still had to beat Finland AFTER the
Soviets to win the gold medals?) Therefore director Gavin O’Connor, who
hadn’t done anything this interesting previously, has to focus on the
development of the team—and on its amazing, remarkable coach Herb
Brooks. Kurt Russell is perfectly cast as Brooks, and gives the
performance of his lifetime. In the past, he’s only rarely even
approached this level of credibility, this devotion to creating a
character.

Eric Guggenheim’s script unavoidably follows a standard line for such
films, and occasionally includes scenes that are all too standard, as
in the brief disagreement between Brooks and his wife (the excellent
Patricia Clarkson). But Guggenheim and O’Connor get very quickly into
the core of the film, and of Brooks’ plans: he wants to coach the
hockey team in a way that hasn’t been done before, to teach them a new
style of playing—to match the Russians literally in their own game. For
those of us who know nothing at all about hockey, some of this will
seem both obvious (you mean they DIDN’T coach like this before) and
mysterious, but it’s presented very credibly. You do not doubt Brooks’
intentions because we see his goals realized.

He initially selects 26 young men from those who’ve turned out to
audition for the team, and tells those who are left that maybe the ones
he rejected are the lucky ones. It’s the summer of 1979, only a
relatively short time before the Winter Olympics of February, 1980—and
the players have to learn there are no stars, that they are a team that
has to function as a unit. Like basketball, hockey does tend to focus
on star players, but that’s not what Brooks did.

We are introduced to the various team members; perhaps the outstanding
actor in the group is Eddie Cahill as goalie Jim Craig; he’s very much
in the moment and focused on his role, and is completely convincing.
Other outstanding actors are Nathan West as Rob McClanahan, Eric
Peter-Kaiser as Mark Johnson and Billy Schneider as his own father,
Buzz. Though we do learn the personalities of the young men involved,
the focus on the movie remains on Herb Brooks and on the team as a
whole. Still, Cahill in particular gets some vivid moments.

The film was cast by first looking for those who resembled the real
team members, then auditioning them as skaters and/or hockey players,
and only then as actors. The result is that many of the cast never
acted before, and haven’t since, but they’re completely believable
here. O’Connor is clearly an expert at deriving good performances from
potentially inadequate actors; I’ll be interested to see what he’ll do
next.

Kurt Russell has been an actor since he was a child, though at one
point he played baseball, hoping to make it to the majors. As a child
actor, his goal was always to please the director, and this has carried
over to his performances as an adult: all too often, he holds something
back, not quite allowing Kurt Russell to disappear into the role. He
wants to be liked for himself as well as the character, and because he
is likeable, this usually is all that’s necessary. But he’s getting
older, and clearly wiser: at no point does good ol’ Kurt peer out of
the squinting eyes of Herb Brooks. Russell has a masterful relationship
with the camera, precisely judging his performance to the scene and to
the shot. He wears his hair not as good ol’ Kurt, but as Herb Brooks
wore his—this may seem a small point, a tiny concession, but it’s what
the role called for. But Russell also does something with his face: he
holds his lips tighter, he narrows his eyes more, to the point that I
wondered if he were in makeup.

The entire cast is excellent; Noah Emmerich plays assistant coach Craig
Patrick in a particularly subtle and layered manner; we see him
gradually come to accept Brooks’ unusual methods, even when he skates
the team into exhaustion after an unenthusiastic showing in Norway.
Emmerich has the face of a guy who would ordinarily be cast as a
villain; his performance here is proof that he’s capable of much more.

O’Connor uses a more-than-realistic approach throughout; that is, the
sound isn’t what you’d hear had you been at the many games the film
depicts; it’s hyper-realistic, crisper, cleaner, and with particular
details highlighted. Sound designer Elliott Nokes and sound technician
Rob Nokes not only deserve great praise for their clean, imaginative
work, they get it: one of the several documentaries on this two-disc
set focuses intelligently on the sound, demonstrating by example some
of the many types of tracks the film used, and how they were woven
together. This kind of documentary should turn up as supplemental DVD
material much more often than it does.

“Miracle” was shot in Canada, which resulted in some criticism from
various quarters. Why couldn’t this all-American movie, that extols an
American Olympics team, have been shot in the United States? That’s a
good question, and the only real answer is budget. But it doesn’t
affect the movie as you’re watching it; to his credit, O’Connor does
not over-emphasize the rah-rah-for-our-side aspect of the story, which
speaks for itself.

Mark Isham’s score is balanced with the movie; in one of the several
documentaries, he explains that at first, he used a “Mozart orchestra,”
of mostly strings; as the story advanced, he scaled up to a
“Tchaikovsky orchestra” with more brass and woodwinds. And for the big
USA-USSR hockey game, he launched into full “Wagner orchestra” mode,
with a huge number of musicians. Isham (pr. ee-sham, by the way) is one
of the best contemporary composers, and his score for “Miracle” is
available on CD.

In a story of triumph, hope and glory, there had to be some
poignancy—and it turned up in real life, not in the film. Herb Brooks
died while the film was in production, but there is some footage of him
discussing the movie with Russell, O’Connor and others of the
filmmakers. Not only do you get to see how precisely Russell played the
man, but there he is, right before your eyes—the man who worked this
miracle. As an end credit says, he didn’t see the movie, but he lived
it.